


His Own Backyard

by Gemmiel



Category: Supernatural
Genre: AU, Destiel - Freeform, First Person, M/M, gender-switched sam, romcom
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-12-05
Updated: 2014-05-06
Packaged: 2018-01-03 13:38:06
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,907
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1071090
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gemmiel/pseuds/Gemmiel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dean Winchester has lived in a small town in Kansas all his life. It's a quiet suburban existence, but he's happy working at his garage (it's the family business), driving the old Impala he inherited from his dad around town, and banging random chicks. But one day, a stranger in a trenchcoat walks into the bar where he hangs out, and Dean discovers exactly what his life has been missing...</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I've been muddling around with this one for a while, waiting for it to take shape in my brain. (The bar scene in 9.09 helped!) I don't generally like AUs much, but I wanted to write a sort of romcom thing (also, Dean kept talking in my head and would NOT shut up, so eventually I had to write it all down). I suspect this setup is similar, if not identical, to a million other AUs, but hopefully it won't feel like a total rehash. 
> 
> The title is from the Kinks' "A Well-Respected Man."

Adler, Kansas is the most boring place on the face of the planet.

Yeah, I’m exaggerating a little. But only a little. Because I’ve lived here all my life, and I’m tellin’ you that the biggest excitement around here in the past twenty years was when the old abandoned Parker place caught on fire. (And no, I totally did not set it on fire by accident while trying to learn to smoke. That’s just a vicious rumor, I swear.)

My home town is boring. My house (which I inherited from my dad) is boring. My life is boring.

Well, except for my ’67 Impala (which I also inherited from my dad). She’s my baby, and she’s not boring. Farthest thing from it. She’s sleek and sexy as hell, a glossy and unblemished black with chrome accents, not to mention an engine that rumbles with a deep-throated growl. And when I tool around town blasting classic rock tapes (which, yeah, I inherited from my dad), she makes me look pretty damn sexy too.

And I’ll admit I never have problems picking up women on a Saturday night. It’s just that none of them ever stick around tlll Sunday morning, let alone any longer. And that’s cool, ‘cause I really don’t want them to. Don’t get me wrong. I’m into women. I’m just not into relationships. Or cuddling. Or long walks on the beach in the rain, or pina coladas, or any of that chick flick crap.

I don’t use 'em and lose 'em. I just let them use me. And let me tell you, none of them are complaining.

I gotta admit, I actually thought this was the ideal lifestyle till last month. Like, the ultimate bachelor existence. But all of a sudden…

I know, I know. So what happened last month to change my mind?

Simple, really. I turned thirty.

I got fucking _old._

*****

Let me back up a bit. If you’ve spent any time at all in Adler, you’ve probably seen me around. I’m the hot guy hanging out at the bar on Main Street every Friday and Saturday night. I'm six foot one, pretty decently built, and I have brown hair with some gold highlights from the sun—it’s summer, and I spend a lot of time in my own backyard, mowing the lawn and fixing up the porch and other suburban crap—and freckles. The freckles (which I’ve had since I was a little kid, damn it) are because of the sun, too. Well, they're more visible in the summer, but they never really fade entirely. I hate 'em, but at this point, I figure the damn things are here to stay. 

But even with freckles, I’m hot. You know it, I know it. Everyone knows it.

Tonight, a month after my thirtieth goddamn birthday, I’m wearing a leather coat (it's way too hot for a coat, but it's yet another inheritance from Dad, and I never go to the bar without it), a Led Zep shirt, and a worn pair of Levi’s. Gorgeous, leggy women are casting appreciative looks in my direction, but for some reason, I’m just not all that interested. 

Oh, hell, who am I kidding? I’m so completely disinterested I think I must have fucking _died,_ and somehow failed to notice.

Let me repeat this for clarification: I am into women. I mean, seriously into women. There’s no question about that. Never has been, never will be. I'm just having a midlife crisis, or something. Because believe me, I am all about showing women a good time.

So when this guy walks in, and I find myself staring at him, it doesn’t mean a goddamned thing. Just that I’ve noticed he’s new.

He’s a little shorter than I am, with rumpled dark hair and eyes so blue I can see their color from across the room. It’s drizzling lightly outside, and he’s wearing a trenchcoat—which, given that it’s also like ninety degrees out, seems like overkill. I guess he isn’t a big rain fan. Maybe he’s made of sugar and worried he’ll melt. 

He looks like he _could_ be spun out of sugar, a sweet and fluffy confection of pale skin and crystalline blue eyes and—

I stop myself right there, because I don’t like where my thoughts are going, and very carefully turn my attention back to my drink. Beer. Budweiser. Because midlife crisis or not, I’m a manly dude, the kind of guy who drinks beer and wears a leather jacket and drives an old American car with a huge engine. Not at all the kind of guy who gets half-hard over a gorgeous, dark-haired model type—unless the model type has boobs, anyway.

Just my luck, though-- the guy walks across to the bar and happens to choose the bar stool right next to mine. I kind of glare at him over the top of my beer mug, because there are plenty of other seats in the place even though it’s Friday night, and there’s no reason for him to sit right next to me. _Personal space, buddy._ But he doesn’t take the hint, just nods at me and orders a beer.

Bobby Singer, the bartender, drops one in front of him. The guy takes a sip, and the pink tip of his tongue slips daintily out to lick the foam off his upper lip.

And goddamnit, all of a sudden I’m no longer just _half_ hard.

“Hey there,” I say, without any intentions of speaking at all. “You’re new, aren’tcha?”

The blue eyes turn in my direction. And _fuck_ , are they blue. It’s like looking up right after a storm’s passed through and the sky's cleared, and the sun lights it to this kinda bright sapphire color. You know what I mean? Blue like no one’s eyes have a right to be. Maybe he’s wearing contacts, because those eyes just can't be real.

“Yes,” he says, in an oddly stilted tone. “I am new in town.”

“Nice to meet you.” I offer him my hand. “Dean Winchester.”

At this point Bobby looks over at me and gives me one of his looks: _Changin' your luck, Winchester?_ I glare back: _Fuck off, old man._ He gives me his wry grin (which you can barely see under that scruffy beard) and turns away. Which is good, because swear to God, I’m totally not hitting on the new guy. I’m just being, you know, neighborly.

New Guy looks at my hand like no one’s ever shook his hand before. At last he takes it, gingerly, and gives me a tentative shake. Even though his heart’s not really in it, the brush of his skin still makes sparks shoot through me. Which is crazy.

Did I mention that I’m totally into women?

“Castiel,” he says. "Castiel Smith."

Of course this guy with impossibly blue eyes has to have an impossible name. He couldn’t be named something ordinary like John or Steve. No, he’s gotta be named _Castiel_. Never heard the name before in my life.

It’s unique, and that suits him.

Damn it.

“What brings you to town?” I say, going for a friendly, jovial tone instead of a nosy one. I’m not sure how well I succeed, because he looks at me with a little suspicion. Maybe he’s a secret agent or something.

Yeah. Because we get so many secret agents in fucking _Kansas._

“Work,” he says, and takes another sip of beer.

His manner is cool, if not outright unfriendly, and that really oughta shut me up. But then the tip of his pink tongue slides out and licks off the foam again, and god _damn._ I mean, how am I supposed to ignore that?

Not that I have ever been or ever will be, now or in the foreseeable future, turned on by the sight of a guy’s tongue. It’s just… well, the guy is sort of a challenge, you know? He came into the bar, sat in the stool right next to me like he was looking for someone to talk to, and now he’s restricting himself to one-word answers. It’s like he wants to come across as an enigma.

It’s working, too.

“Cool,” I say. “I run a garage. The family business, you know? I inherited it from my dad.”

“A… garage,” he says, very carefully, like it’s a foreign word and he isn’t sure how to pronounce it. “You... repair cars?”

“Yep. Sometimes I rebuild 'em from the ground up. I've restored some gorgeous cars that were total crap when I first got 'em.”

“Odd,” he says, throwing a sideways look at me through dark lashes—and okay, that’s sexy as hell, and I can’t even pretend I haven’t noticed it. My dick, at least, is totally aware that he’s hot. Which is really kind of alarming, because my dick doesn’t make a habit of sitting up and begging for guys no matter what they look like. “I didn’t peg you as the mechanic type.”

“Oh, yeah?” I’m starting to relax into this, because this is more like the regular flirtatious conversation I usually have at this bar. Admittedly my normal flirting is usually with women. Still, this feels like more familiar ground. “What did you peg me as, then?”

He looks at me—a long, searching look. It’s unnerving, like he can see right down to my soul. At last he says, “A hunter, maybe.”

“A hunter?” I shrug. “Actually, Bobby here used to take me and my sister hunting every now and again. I was never much good at it, though. I’m a lousy shot.”

“Yeah, right.” Behind the bar, Bobby snorts. “You were just too candy-assed to want to hurt a pretty little deer. Now your sister— _she_ had the killer instinct.”

“That’s why she’s a lawyer,” I say. “She’s vicious.”

Castiel is looking at me oddly. “You have a… sister?”

“Sammy,” I say proudly, and refrain from whipping out the photos in my wallet. Barely. “She's the brains of the family. Put her through school myself after Dad died.”

“Sammy,” Castiel says, as if to himself. “That is not a girl’s name.”

“It is when it’s short for Samantha.” I’m a little irritated, to be honest. Who is this guy to be criticizing someone else’s name? He’s named _Castiel,_ for Chrissake. But then he takes another sip of his beer, and licks the foam off his lip, and—

Well, shit. If he doesn’t quit doing that soon, I might just lean over there and do it for him.

Fuck, I think to myself. I am in _so_ much trouble.


	2. Chapter 2

Adler, Kansas may in fact be the dullest place on the face of the planet.

At least that was my original conclusion after a month of residence here. I am accustomed to living in a large city, and Adler has no symphony, no museums to speak of (I refuse to acknowledge the existence of the Adler Museum of Farming Implements), and only a single library. It is safe to say that Adler has left me entirely unimpressed, not to mention bored almost to tears.

But now that I’m seated at this bar, sipping a beer, the town no longer seems quite as dull.

There’s a man seated at the bar, right next to me, who is the reason Adler has suddenly taken on a new sheen in my eyes. A rather handsome man, whose legs are too long to fit comfortably beneath the bar, whose hair is so short it could adorn a soldier's head, who wears a leather jacket like a suit of armor. I confess I sat down next to him on purpose, because despite the military hair and bearing, something about his easy smile appealed to me at first glance.

Smiles have never come easily to me. Perhaps that’s why I appreciate them in other people.

The man, who introduced himself as Dean Winchester, is talking cheerfully about a car he just restored—something called a “Plymouth Roadrunner”—and I am listening, and attempting to sound interested even though cars are a subject I know absolutely nothing about. I have never cared overmuch for driving. Given the choice, I would far rather fly. Nevertheless, the topic is clearly important to this Dean, and so I am doing my best to pay attention. In any event, even though the subject is Greek to me (and I mean that only metaphorically, as I read both ancient and modern Greek), I enjoy Dean's enthusiasm, the way he waves his hands around, the way his eyes light up as he talks.

By the time his explanations about horsepower and torque and era-appropriate paint colors are winding down, I am working on my second beer. I rarely drink, and I am beginning to realize that having more than one beer on an empty stomach may have been an error. I feel mildly inebriated.

It’s a pleasant feeling. I like it.

Dean’s voice is perfectly modulated to carry to my ears despite the loud music (which I believe belongs to the genre called “country”) and the even louder sound of conversations going on around us. I have the certainty that Dean makes a habit out of hanging out in bars, and knows precisely how to pitch his voice to make himself heard. He also knows how to focus entirely on the person he is speaking to, which is both flattering and slightly alarming. I notice him watching my mouth as I lick the foam of the beer off my upper lip, and I begin to suspect that he is “hitting on me.”

I consider that, and decide I don’t mind.

I do not make a practice of picking up strangers (even attractive ones with compelling green eyes and an easy grin) in bars. Indeed, I do not make a practice of picking up anyone, really. I have had exactly one significant relationship in my life—Daphne, my high school sweetheart whom I married while we were both still in college—and when my marriage ended, two years ago, I felt no particular desire to go out and find another sexual partner. It was easier, I decided, to embrace abstinence. Simpler. Less complicated. Less messy.

I find I am beginning to rethink that decision. 

Perhaps it is the beer. Yes, it must be the influence of alcohol that makes me think about touching this stranger, kissing the slight stubble along his jawline, running my fingers through his too-neat hair and rumpling it. These are not thoughts I have often. And it must be alcohol that makes me laugh at the story Dean is now telling me about his sister, because I almost never laugh.

It is a surprisingly pleasant sensation.

“—so this guy decided to break into our house while I was at work, right? Only Sammy was home sick from school, watching TV on the couch downstairs. She was only sixteen, but she grabbed a frying pan like fucking Rapunzel and smacked him upside the head. He was out cold on the floor when the cops got there.”

I do not understand the reference to fucking Rapunzel, but I laugh anyway, because the pride and amusement in Dean’s voice is so very evident, and because it _is_ quite funny to think of a home intruder laid low by a frying pan. “You obviously love your sister very much,” I say at last.

“Oh, hell, yeah.” His eyes soften, growing fond and warm. “My dad died when I was twenty, and the last thing he told me before he died was to take care of her. Not that I wasn't already taking care of her, pretty much, because he was sick for a long time, and... anyway, the state let me have custody till she was eighteen, and after that—well, there's not a thing I wouldn’t do for that kid.”

“Including dropping outta college,” says the old man behind the bar.

“Shut _up,_ ” Dean says, and his eyes ice over a bit. “Not like I was doing great at KU anyway, is it? Hell, I was lucky to make it through high school. Anyway, I needed to save the money so I could get Sammy through school.”

Dean has clearly sacrificed some of his own dreams for his younger sister, and I find myself oddly touched by this. There is obviously more to him than shows on the surface. It is evident that this Dean Winchester is, as they say, “more than just a pretty face.”

Though he is certainly that as well. Close up, I can see there are faint brownish spots scattered across his nose and cheeks. They are charming, giving his handsome, chiseled features a more boyish quality than one would expect at a distance.

“Hey,” he says, grinning at me. I am almost certain it is intended as a flirtatious smile, and that makes me warm inside. Although part of that may be the alcohol. I have discovered that I like alcohol, and I like Dean Winchester. I am even beginning to find Adler tolerable. “Whatcha looking at?”

“I was studying your ephelides,” I say, trying to match his flirtatious tone.

He blinks at me. “My what?”

“Your freckles. I like them.”

His cheeks change color, turning a dull red. “Uh,” he says, fumbling awkwardly with his beer mug. His ready flow of speech falters for the first time since I have met him, and I am dismayed to realize that my effort at returning his flirtation was not a success. “Oh. Well, um. Thanks.”

Behind the bar, the older man named Bobby snorts loudly.

“Shut _up,_ ” Dean says again, for no reason I can determine. He lifts his gaze from his mug and hits me with the full force of those green eyes. It is... disconcerting. “Hey, Castiel,” he says. “It’s noisy in here. Want to go across the street and get a burger?”

Apparently I am not a complete failure at flirtation after all. I gulp down the final mouthful of my second beer, then put the mug down on the counter with a thump. I feel lightheaded, cheerful, _happy,_ which is not at all my usual emotional state. Even when Daphne and I were married, I was never what you would call “the life of the party,” and I very rarely smile. But now I am smiling, and cannot seem to stop. 

“Yes,” I agree. “I would very much like to have a burger with you.”


	3. Chapter 3

The way this guy eats is like... porn.

I know, that sounds stupid. But I'm serious. The way he drank his beer and licked the foam off his lips was just the beginning. Watching Castiel eat a burger is just fucking amazing. He's so damn _carnivorous,_ his strong white teeth tearing into it like it's the best thing he's ever eaten. And then there's the way he licks away the little dribbles of ketchup that get away from him, licks the salt off his fingers after he eats a French fry...

I must be horny. Haven't been laid recently enough, that's it. Because watching another man eat shouldn't be making all these dirty, dirty thoughts run through my head. I'm not into guys, as I may have said already. I mean, sure, Dr. Sexy is pretty damn accurately named, and I'm not gonna pretend I haven't thought of myself alone with him in an elevator a time or two. But that's fiction, and this-- _this_ is reality.

I'm sitting here at a table in a cruddy fifties-themed restaurant, watching a guy eat a burger, and I'm way harder than I ever get watching a girl take it all off at a strip club.

My phone buzzes in the depths of my leather jacket, and I take it out and glance at the screen long enough to see: _Dean, I need to talk to you._ I roll my eyes, and shove it back into my pocket.

"Problems?" Castiel inquires. His voice is deep and low, like black velvet, but with a gravelly quality that makes the hair on my arms stand up. I'm getting goosebumps from another guy's voice. Jesus. 

"Nah," I say. "My little sister. She's out in California, but we're still pretty close. It's nothing that won't wait a while, though."

"Okay," Castiel says. He finishes the last bite of his burger, licks his fingers in a totally obscene way that makes my cock twitch with unabashed hunger, and sits back in his seat, his mouth curved with what looks like lazy satisfaction. "I don't suppose you would care for dessert?"

 _Oh, fuck yeah, I would love dessert,_ I almost blurt. But he seems to be a really literal guy, and I don't think he'd get the double entendre. He'd probably just ask the waitress for a hot fudge sundae or something. And right now there is no possible way I can bear to sit here and watch him lick hot fudge and ice cream off a spoon. I'm already thinking about him kneeling between my legs, that pink tongue working me, stroking me...

Fuck. What the hell is wrong with me, anyway? I don't know this guy from Adam, and for all I know he's married or in a relationship. But I don't think he is, because the way he's looking at me makes me think he's just as interested in me as I am in him. The way he keeps _staring_ at me.

Those eyes. They are so damn _blue._

"Don't think so," I croak. I toss some money on the table and stand up. My legs are trembling. "C'mon, let's get out of here."

He follows me readily enough. I walk out of the restaurant, noticing that the drizzle has stopped. I turn, leading him into an alley, and he follows me without hesitation. Like he trusts me. Like he knows me. When I turn around, he's right behind me, so close I could bend forward and kiss him. So I do, leaning forward and brushing my lips over his, more like a question than a kiss.

He has me up against the brick wall in a heartbeat, his mouth against mine, going for me the way he went for the burger. Carnivorous, like I said. My hands reach up and twist in his hair, and his thigh slips between mine, and suddenly we're all tangled up together, kissing the hell out of each other. He tastes like beer and burgers and salt, and something else, something primal and raw, something that has me licking my way into his mouth, wanting more. Our tongues touch, and I think I might be groaning. 

He's just a little shorter than I am, and our bodies fit together perfectly, our cocks aligning even through our clothes. Rubbing up against him feels incredible. I'm so hungry for him that I could get off here and now, but this guy is special somehow, and deserves something better than a quickie in an alley near a dumpster. This guy deserves roses and scented sheets and breakfast in bed, at a bare minimum.

I manage to pull away, just for a few seconds, and gasp out an invitation.

"Castiel." My voice sounds like I have a cold. "Want to come back to my house?"

"I was hoping you would ask," he says softly, and his voice is just as hoarse as mine. "Yes, Dean. I would like to come back to your house."


End file.
